KAMPALA INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY

WESTERN CAMPUS.

FACULTY OF EDUCATION

NAME: KEKIMURI AISHA.

REG NO: 2021-04-03562

LECTURER’S NAME: MR. BANYWANA ASUMAN

COURSE WORK

Discuss with relevant examples for the decline of Muravid Dynasty in

West Africa
THE ALMORAVID DYNASTY

The term ‘Almoravid’ comes from the Arabic word ‘al-Murabit, literally meaning “one who is
trying” but figuratively meaning “one who is ready for battle at a fortress”.
The Almoravid dynasty was an imperial Berber Muslim dynasty centered in Morocco. It
established an empire in the 11th century that stretched over the western Maghreb and Al-
Andalus. The dynasty was founded by Abdallah Ibn Yasin. The Almoravid capital was
Marrakesh, a city which was the ruling house founded in 1062. The Gudala nomadic Berber
tribes of the Sahara, traversing the territory between the Draa, the Niger and the Senegal rivers.
The Almoravids were crucial in preventing the fall of Al-Andalus to the Iberian Christian
kingdoms, when they decisively defeated a coalition at the Battle of Sagrajas in 1086. This
enabled them to control an empire that stretched 3,000 kilometers North to South, from
Senegambia to Spain.
Abdallah Ibn Yasin was a Gazzula Berber and probably a convert rather than a born Muslim. His
name can be read as “son of Ya Sin”. Ibn Yasin certainly had the ardour of a puritan zealot, his
creed was mainly characterised by a rigid formalising and a strict adherence to the dictates of the
Quran and orthodox tradition.
Ibn Yasin’s arguments were disputed by his audience. He responded to questioning with charges
of apostasy and handed out harsh punishments for the slightest deviations. The Gudala soon had
enough and expelled him almost immediately after the death of his protector, Yahaya Ibn
Ibrahim, sometime in the 1040s.
Ibn Yasin, however, found a more favourable reception among the neighbouring Lamtuna
people. Probably sensing the useful organizing power of Ibn Yasin’s pious fervor, the Lamtuna
chieftain Yahya Ibn Umar al-Lamtuni invited the man to preach to his people. The Lamtuna
leaders, however, kept Ibn Yasin on a careful leash, forging a more productive partnership
between them. Invoking stories of the early life of Muhammed, Ibn Yasin preached that conquest
was a necessary addendum to Islamicization, that it was not enough to merely adhere to God’s
law, law was necessary to also destroy opposition to it. In Ibn Yasin’s ideology, anything and
everything outside to Islamic law could be characterized as “opposition”. He identified tribalism,
in particular, as an obstacle. He believed it was not enough to urge his audiences to put aside
their blood loyalties and ethnic differences, and embrace the equality of all Muslims under the
Sacred Law, it was necessary to make them do so. For the Lamtuna leadership, this new ideology
dovetailed with their long desire to refound the Sanhaja union and recover their lost dominions.
In the early1050s, the Lamtuna, under the joint leadership of Yahya Ibn Umar and Abdallah Ibn
Yasin-soon calling themselves the al-Murabitin (Almoravids)-set out on a campaign to bring
their neighbours over to their cause.

DECLINE OF THE ALMORAVID DYNASTY

Abu-Bakr died in 1087 andso began the collapse of thesouthern Almoravids. Manyof the best
soldiers had also returned north tojoin Yusuf in his conquests. These factorscombined to weaken
the southern Sanhaja’sresolve and unity, and they were overrunagain by the Soninke and later by
the Malinke.

Three years afterwards, under Yusuf's son and successor, Ali ibn Yusuf, Sintra and Santarém
were added, and he invaded Iberia again in 1119 and 1121, but the tide had turned, as the French
had assisted the Aragonese to recover Zaragoza. In 1138, Ali ibn Yusuf was defeated by Alfonso
VII of León, and in the Battle of Ourique (1139), by Afonso I of Portugal, who thereby won his
crown. Lisbon was conquered by the Portuguese in 1147.

Yusuf took the northern Almoravids armythrough Morocco and as far as southern Spain. They
invaded Morocco in 1055 and foundedthe city of Marrakesh (1062) as their capitaland later they
captured Fès (1069). They united Morocco under a single government. In a fewyears, by 1091,
the Almoravid dominated allthe Muslim states in Spain, except for Valencia which was
conquered by ‘El Cid’ (Lord Rodrigo) who went to Spain to fight the Christian powers at the
request of the Spanish Muslims

According to some scholars, Ali ibn Yusuf was a new generation of leadership that had forgot
the desert life for the comforts of the city. He was defeated by the combined action of his
Christian foes in Iberia and the agitation of Almohads (the Muwahhids) in Morocco. After Ali
ibn Yusuf's death in 1143, his son Tashfin ibn Ali lost ground rapidly before the Almohads. In
1146 he was killed in a fall from a precipice while attempting to escape after a defeat near Oran.

His two successors were Ibrahim ibn Tashfin and Ishaq ibn Ali, but their reigns were short. The
conquest of the city of Marrakech by the Almohads in 1147 marked the fall of the dynasty,
though fragments of the Almoravids (the Banu Ghaniya), continued to struggle in the Balearic
Islands, and finally in Tunisia.

Military organization

Abdallah Ibn Yussin imposed very strict discipline measures on his forces for every breach of his
laws The Almoravid first military leader, Yahya Ibn Umar al-Lamtuni, gave them a good
military organization. Their main force was infantry, armed with javelins in the front ranks and
pikes behind, which formed into a phalanx, and was supported by camelmen and horsemen on
the flanks. They also had a flag carrier as the front who guided the forces behind him, when the
flag was upright, the combatants behind would stand and when it was turned down, they would
sit.

Al-Bakri reports that, while in combat, the Almoravids did not pursue those who fled in front of
them. Their fighting was intense and they did not retreat when disadvantage by an advancing
opposing force, they preferred death over defeat. These characteristics were possibly unusual at
the time.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion the Almoravids contributed to the spread of Islam in West Africa. After the decline
of Ghana, the other great empires like; Mali, Songhay were all Muslim states.
 FOR FURTHER READING

Ajayi, J..F.A and Michael Crowder History of West Africa. Vol. 2 Longman Group Ltd. London
1974
Ampadu B.K. Landmarks of African History to AD 1800 for Senior High School. NUUT Co.
Ltd Kumasi Ghana 2012
Boahen, A.A. et al Tropics in West Africa History. Longman Group Ltd. Londonand
Basingstoke 1986
Fage, J.D. A History of West Africa, Cambridge University Press 1969
Fynn , J.K. and R. Addo-Fening History for Senior Secondary schools. Evans Brothers, Ltd.
London 1991
Insoll, T. The Archaeology of Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University
press. 2003
Levtzion, N. and J.F.P. Hopkins, Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History,
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. 2000 edition. 1981
Messier, R. A. Almoravids and the Meanings of Jihad, Santa Barbara, Calif.: praeger. 2010
Mones, H. “The conquest of North Africa and Berber resistance”, in M. Elfasi, ed., General
History of Africa, Africa from the Seventh to the Eleventh Century, UNESCO. 1992 edition, Ch.
9, p. 224-46. 1988